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The Pirates clubbed 170 home runs as a team last season, which was the fourth-highest total in the National League. Their 170 bombs was a big increase from a total of 107 in 2011, when they finished 27th out of 30 MLB teams in the HR department. Here’s a look at the five longest Bucco homers of the 2012 season, via ESPN Home Run Tracker:

Andrew McCutchen took over centerfield at PNC Park in 2009 after Nate McLouth was traded, and fans weren’t happy at first. Cutch debuted with an impressive showing against the Mets, and hasn’t looked back since. In 2010, his first full season, he put up impressive numbers but was the lone bright spot on a terrible team. The Bucs took off in 2011, led by Cutch, who may have become too fatigued and put too much pressure on himself as the team faded down the stretch. After ending the first month of the 2012 season without a home run, Cutch went off. He flirted with a .400 average and was the clear MVP winner as the team soared to the league-best record in July. Unfortunately, that .380+ average slowly dropped as August began and the team collapsed as Cutch cooled off. But what’s most impressive about his numbers from last season is that he did it all while having down months in April, August, and September. Still, he picked up a Silver Slugger Award and Gold Glove, which won’t be the last awards he’ll win in his career. Even with his electrifying defense and pop at the plate, he still has room to improve. Luckily, Cutch is locked up through at least 2018 and when this franchise finally gets turned around, he’ll be right in the middle of everything. Within the next few years, he could very well move into the #1 spot in this top ten.

We had the opportunity to head down to the season ticket holder batting practice at PNC Park tonight. After taking a few cuts in the cages, we headed to the Hall of Fame Club for a light dinner. In the Club, they were playing a video on loop of the 2013 promotions.

There were four in particular that really stood out:

– A.J. Burnett Free Shirt Friday
Friday, April 12th vs. Cincinnati

– Andrew McCutchen Bobblehead
Saturday, April 20th vs. Atlanta

– A.J. Burnett Bobblehead
Saturday, May 18th vs. Houston

– Replica Sunday Alternate Hat
Sunday, June 16th vs. Los Angeles

The introduction of the new Sunday alternate jersey has been highly anticipated. There is a replica alternate jersey giveaway on August 4th, but they unfortunately did not have a picture of it on the slide show. That hat obviously looks nothing like this possible mock-up we found a few weeks back.

The yellow crown with black bill would certainly be an interesting look. Based on the picture, we assume it’s similar to the hat worn in the early ’70s:

The Pirates wore a comparable uniform back in 2011 when they celebrated the 1971 World Series:

However, this leaves us unsure of how the jerseys will turn out. They could be similar to the ones above, but who knows if they will to go back to that style.

Anyway, more of the promotions should be on display at PirateFest this weekend. Hopefully they reveal the Sunday alternate jersey as well.

Bill James’ first batch of projections for the 2013 season were recently released and can be found on the player pages at FanGraphs. Here’s a look at some of the Pirates hitters are projected to perform next year:

– James has Alex Presley bouncing back with a .288 average after a sophomore slump campaign in which he hit just .237 and traveled to Triple-A Indianapolis a couple of times.

– Andrew McCutchen is projected to regress a bit after his MVP-caliber year. A .286 average with 24 homers would be nice, but not as stellar as his .327 avg/31 homers in 2012.

– Clint Barmes is expected to do pretty much the same thing at the plate as he did last season.

– Gaby Sanchez is pretty “meh” at .263 batting average with 11 home runs and 44 runs batted in. Another player the Bucs picked up at July’s deadline, Travis Snider, is in the same boat – .278 average with 11 HR and 43 RBI.

– James still projects Garrett Jones to put up decent power, but expects a 20 point drop off in batting average (.274 to .254).

– Jose Tabata will look to continue his disappointing career. Another 3 homer year with just 12 stolen bases; at least his average is projected to jump up to .278.

– Michael McKenry is expected to have a pretty similar season. It’ll be interesting to see how he adjusts to a larger role in 2013.

– Neil Walker is projected to have a nice season. We’ll take a .275 average and 17 homers any day from a starting second baseman.

– James projects Pedro Alvarez to keep improving upon his solid season in 2012. Another season with about 30 homers and somewhere around 90 RBI would be great from Pedro.

– Last but not least, Starling Marte is expected to have a big time season. A .297 average with 15 home runs and 31 stolen bases would be tremendous for Starling. It’s hard to predict his performance since he’s unproven and appeared in just 47 games, but it still gets us excited to think about the potential he has.

Sometime within the next week or so, we’ll take a look Bill James’ predictions for the Pirates pitchers.